By Tiernan Ray

Canaccord Genuity‘s Mike Walkley today offers his monthly survey of smartphone sales, writing that sales around the world were “seasonally softer” in August as consumers awaited a number of “high-tier” product introductions from Apple (AAPL), Samsung Electronics (005930KS), and others.

Samsung, whose Galaxy S4 was the top selling phone at U.S. carriers Verizon Communcations (VZ), Sprint (S) and T-Mobile USA (TMUS), and number two at AT&T (T), gained share in the month, he believes, and may have used pricing action globally to boost sales:

Further, our analysis indicates Samsung has initiated certain price cuts for the Galaxy S4 late in the June quarter that was maintained through July and August. We believe these price cuts combined with Samsung’s aggressive marketing and effective advertising campaign could further pressure competing high-end smartphones sales. Therefore, we anticipate continued high-end share gains for the Galaxy S4 versus the competition ahead of the iPhone products expected to ship later this month.

Samsung yesterday unveiled the third installment of its over-sized phablet phone, the Galaxy Note 3.

Our global surveys indicated softer mid/low-tier Android smartphone sales from Chinese OEMs due to subsidy shifts and normal August seasonality in China. We believe the softer low/mid-tier Chinese OEM sales combined with Samsung’s aggressive promotions and pricing for its broad low/mid-tier smartphone portfolio led to strong sales and overall market share gains for Samsung in all smartphone market tiers. We believe these market share gains are consistent with Samsung’s strategy to maximize and consolidate smartphone market share ahead of the anticipated September iPhone product launches.

Apple, whose iPhone 5 was still a top-selling device, saw “steady” sales in August, Walkley believes. Apple is expected to unveil new iPhone models at a media event next Tuesday at its headquarters in Cupertino. Walkley is upbeat about prospects for a lower-priced iPhone, which may be among next week’s announcements:

We believe the stronger than we expected iPhone sales during the June quarter due to a much stronger mix of legacy iPhone 4S/4 sales and the continued strong ongoing demand for the more affordable iPhone.

Nokia (NOK), which Monday said it would sell its handset division to Microsoft (MSFT), has seen some gains for its Lumia line of phones running Microsoft’s Windows Phone operating system:

Our surveys indicated positive sales rep reviews and decent sales for the Lumia 1020 at AT&T. Further, our surveys indicated positive reviews though modest sales for the entry- level Lumia 521 and high-tier Lumia 925 at T-Mobile. However, our global surveys indicate gradually improving Windows Phone 8 smartphone sales due to strong sales of the Lumia 520 and other mid/low-tier Lumia smartphones. In fact, our surveys indicated solid Lumia 520 sales not only in emerging markets such as Russia and key APAC region countries but also in developed markets such as the UK and the US. We believe the growing Lumia sales, especially in the harder-to-track mid/low-tier smartphone segments, are leading to gradual WP8 smartphone share gains.

Walkley cut estimates for BlackBerry (BBRY) for this year to 24 million units sold from a prior 26.7 million, and cut estimates for 2015 to 20.7 million units form 22.7 million, to reflect what his “checks” suggest continue to be “very soft” sales of the BB10-based Z10, Q10, and Q5 released this year:

Our US August wireless store surveys indicate continued very soft Z10 and Q10 sales at Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile. Many store representatives we spoke with indicated minimal interest in and sales of the Q10. Given BlackBerry’s installed base of QWERTY handset users, it is surprising how weak sales are for the Q10. In fact, the overall lack of consumer interest in the Q10 appears to have considerably weakened over the past few weeks. In addition, our US surveys indicated minimal consumer interest in and sales of the Z10 smartphone. Further our global surveys indicated weak sales of the more affordable Q5 smartphone and rapidly declining legacy BB7 sales post the BB10 launch and BlackBerry’s announcement to support BBM on competing smartphone platforms. In fact, now that Android and iOS will support BBM, we anticipate a sharp decline in BB7 consumer sales, particularly in emerging markets, as consumers upgrade older BB7 devices to affordable Android smartphones with their BBM networks intact […] Further, our conversations with global distributors indicate high BlackBerry channel inventory levels despite sharp recent ASP declines in the channel for BB10 smartphones. Due to high channel inventory levels combined with very soft sell-through trends, we are lowering our F2014 BlackBerry smartphone sell-in estimates from 26.7M units to 24.1M units and our F2015 estimates from 22.7M to 20.7M units. Please see our separate BlackBerry report published today titled “Updating estimates due to soft BB7 and BB10 smartphone sales and high channel inventory levels” for further details on our BlackBerry thesis. We maintain our SELL rating and $8 price target.

Walkley also cut his estimates for HTC (2498TW) to reflect “continued aggressive pricing from Samsung and other OEMs” and “the likely launch of new iPhone products.”

Walkley now thinks the company will sell 5 million smartphones in the September quarter, down from a prior 6 million-unit estimate, and thinks revenue will come in at $46.9 billion in New Taiwan dollars, below the company’s own forecast for $50 billion to $60 billion.

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There are 4 comments

SEPTEMBER 5, 2013 12:51 P.M.

Anonymous wrote:

Great timing with the bogus cold water on BBRY Canaccord!

SEPTEMBER 5, 2013 12:53 P.M.

BB wrote:

"In fact, the overall lack of consumer interest in the Q10 appears to have considerably weakened over the past few weeks." This guy is so stupid, his statement contradicts his intention.

SEPTEMBER 5, 2013 1:10 P.M.

@ BB wrote:

He's not stupid. And it's rhetorically not a contradiction. He was being redundant. Which is fine, emphatically.

Intention? He's kind. He gave numbers for 2014-2015. Ha.

As for you. I hope you have a bullet proof liver.

SEPTEMBER 5, 2013 10:46 P.M.

Jayr wrote:

Nokia shareholders should reject Microsoft bid for Nokia devices & services. Q3 & Q4 sales will be strong across the globe. Lumia 1020 is only available at At&t in the US and all three colors are best seller (1, 3 & 6)at Amazon. If only Lumia 1020 is available at Verizon, Sprint & T-Mobile, this phone will be the #1 in the US.

About Tech Trader Daily

Tech Trader Daily is a blog on technology investing written by Barron’s veteran Tiernan Ray. The blog provides news, analysis and original reporting on events important to investors in software, hardware, the Internet, telecommunications and related fields. Comments and tips can be sent to: techtraderdaily@barrons.com.